athlon 64 overclocking problems

[Messudieh]

I'm going to try to keep this short, because I'm hoping there's a simple solution, but I'll give you a rundown of what's happening:

Basically, I can't seem to overclock my 3000 winchester, and I have no clue why. As stated I have a DFI Ultra-D, and a gigabyte of this ram. It is running perfectly at stock speeds...2-3-2-5 1T @ DDR400. I have a 485 watt enermax noise taker PSU, and all of the plugs are in the motherboard properly. The only video card I'm running is a single 6600GT

My problem is that when I raise the FSB past about 215 I get this error:

windows did not start, because the following file is missing or corrupt:
\windows\system32\config\system

I've tried just about everything I can think of too. I've lowered the multiplier to like...6, LDT/FSB ratio to 4, loosened the timings, and raised the voltages slightly, updated the BIOS, and nothing has helped. The PCI-E is locked at 100 Mhz. I am running water cooling on my cpu and video card currently, and the core is at a chilly 21 degrees. The Chipset is at 45 right now, but the fan doesn't kick into high by default until 55, and it's never gone that high. Even below the 215, at say...210 FSB, I'm experiencing some stability problems.

Now, I am a fairly experienced overclocker with an athlon XP system, but this is my first experience with an A64. I picked DFI, the proc, and this RAM, because they were reviewed to be good overclockers. I really don't think it's any of them either (although I could be wrong).

Now, I am running Windows on a Western Digital 80GB 8MB cache IDE hard drive, and I'm using another WD 200 SATA for storage. The hard drive (or something to do with the way the motherboard interfaces with it) seems to be the culprit in all of this, but I don't know how to fix it. I am running the SATA off port 4 just in case 1 and 2 aren't locked for some reason.

I also might try popping off the chipset fan and putting some AS 5 on it, just in case...I'll also do the mod that makes it into a SLI chipset.

Any suggestions on what might fix this would be greatly appreciated. The system runs smooth as butter at stock speeds, but that's not why I got it; I want to overclock it, and I am very confused as to why I can't.

If you need any more info about my system to better troubleshoot it, just ask.

 

[mooncancook]

having similar problem here. I can't OC my 3000+ not even by a bit no matter what i tried. Right now I blame it on my 20pin PSU. I have a superflower/TTGI 550W modular 24pin PSU coming. When it arrives i'll see if i'll get better results.

 

[Jscanavan]

I've got the same mb & cpu (Monarch oem) and I'm using OCZ 2-3-2-6 1T DDR400 2x512 memory. If I set the ldt/fsb 3x, cpu mult 6x, mem to 100mhz( really 150), I can get it to boot and run fine at 300mhz. (6x, 1800) Following step 2 of the A64 oc guide, I can't get the cpu to work past 215, x9 1935 @ 2.55v 55C. Cranking the cpu to 2.65v, I can get all the way to 245x9, but things heat up too fast for comfort. It sounds like a batch of duds.

 

[Messudieh]

well, I do have a 20 pin PSU too, but could that really be the cause?

 

[benrico]

I have the same mobo, mem, and proc..., hmm I think about this and try to post later.

 

[yliu]

Seems as if your PCI bus isn't being locked... try to use 210 FSB since that gets you into windows, and then use clockgen for nforce4 to check all the clock speeds, see if your PCI is at 33 to 34.

EDIT:

Oh, also try a different PATA or SATA slot for your hard drive, see if that makes a difference.

 

[Messudieh]

No difference, and I can't change IDE channels or windows won't boot under any settings...something about improper boot media or something...I think the only way I'd be able to boot it on the other IDE channel would be to reformat the drive, and I don't want to do that right now.

@ 210 FSB, the PCI is still at 33.34Mhz, just like it's supposed to be.

Benrico: have you overclocked yours at all? If so, how has it gone?

 

[Messudieh]

oh, I found this site too. I'm going to look into it a lot more in depth...all DFI all the time.

 

[mustap]

i have almost the same setup as you and get the same problem.the difference is that i can overclock up to 215 with no problem.after that the computer stucks at the dmi verification and then it reboots by itself.let us know if u find a solution to your problem.(i have tried all loose timings-voltages etc etc)

 

[AWhackWhiteBoy]

Originally posted by: mooncancook
having similar problem here. I can't OC my 3000+ not even by a bit no matter what i tried. Right now I blame it on my 20pin PSU. I have a superflower/TTGI 550W modular 24pin PSU coming. When it arrives i'll see if i'll get better results.

you'll love that PSU

 

[sal69]

the a8n cannot lock the ide-channels.
its a bug asaf, and it will totaly corrupt your partition over 240 or something. also the first 2 s-ata ports (nforce) are not locked correctly ....

 

[perillo34]

I might have a solution, go into to CPU=Z and check on your PDP to make sure it is cas 2-3-2-5 at 200mhz, I got a stick from New Egg that stated it was this but in actuality it was only at those timing in 166mhz, and no matter how loose the timing were I could not get it past 215 super stable. The only reason I found this out was when I upgraded to a second stick of the 512mb from newegg, and found that this stick was actually at the Rated timings and could do 235 at 2.5-3-2-10 with no problems. I hope this helps out, I was pissed at the time and sent the stick back to newegg, to exchange it. It fixed my ocing problems on my nf7-s version 2 at the time, now on my Epox 9nda3j it is running at the same speeds no problem.

 

[GuitarDaddy]

Originally posted by: sal69
the a8n cannot lock the ide-channels.
its a bug asaf, and it will totaly corrupt your partition over 240 or something. also the first 2 s-ata ports (nforce) are not locked correctly ....

Don't know why you posted this in the DFI thread, but I think you have some misinformation.

I have the A8N with and IDE drive and 2 raptors on Nforce sata1 and sata2, I have been running with HTT @ 289 for over two months with zero problems, I have tested up to HTT 325 with no problems.

The 240-250mhz limit is strickly ram at 1T command rate (246mhz on my board). And yes if you try and push ram higher than the limit at 1T it will often corrupt the hard drive.

All of the locks work perfectly on this board. Although many people are quick to blame their problems on non working locks, In 2+ months of working with people daily on several forums I have yet to see a single verifiable case of the locks not working on the A8N.

I'm continually amuzed by people who didn't do their homework on component compatability, haven't studied the overclocking guides that are available, and have little or no overclocking experience, and in many cases didn't even read their mobo manuals.
They try to OC to 2.6-2.7 out of the box on thier first attempt and upon failure they blame everything from the mobo, to the CPU, to their RAM and everthing in between.

Maybe the mobo manufacturers should build in a compentency test that must be passed before the overclocking options become available in bios

 

[Messudieh]

Well, I found the problem...one of my sticks of RAM is bad.

This is about the first thing I should have checked, but didn't because for the most part everything was working ok at DDR400. There were a few occasional crashes, but nothing I thought I should be worried about. Looking back, that was the sign of bad RAM, but I just played it off as something wrong with the program. And since it was so infrequent, I didn't think anything of it. Now that I'm trying to overclock it, the problem presents itself in full force when I try to clock it up at all.

I tested both sticks, and one goes to at least 220, which is still a lot less than what I was hoping for...but at least it's something. I may need to tweak it more, or I might send back both modules; I don't totally know yet.

Anyway, for people who are having the same types of problems that I am; test both pieces of RAM individually, and see if one is having problems.

 

[Snowice]

if you aren't afraid of the beta bios, give them a try. the latest one (2-18) helped me